Emerald Days and Sapphire Nights

Thursday, May 10, 2018

At work the other day, my friend who is a rock guitarist, starting talking about some of his bad dates from Tinder. I feel like everyone I know has crazy stories from that app, but that isn't the point of this post. Anyway, he was talking about this one girl and how she was like a finance person and was all *square motion with his hands* and how she had a Gucci purse and immediately knew she wasn't his type. Which I get, because he's artsy and skateboards and is all rock and roll stuff. And he described the rest of the date and it was horrible. But when he said something about her Gucci I immediately got internally offended. He wasn't saying it an offensive way at all (he's a polite gentleman), but still it rubbed me the wrong way. So I started thinking about why such a simple comment that he meant nothing by, bothered me so much. And then it hit me. Women get judged by men for having designer things.

To men (I'm now leaving my friend and his opinions behind and moving to men in general) a women who loves designer shoes or purses or whatever is a high maintenance person and automatically loves shopping and can't follow a budget. However, I submit to you that it is exactly the opposite. Women who are single and have designer things have usually been working their tail off on the careers and had to save up for a while to reward themselves with something that expensive. They don't expect someone else to provide for them and to buy them clothes and purses, because very clearly they can do that themselves. A woman with expensive tastes should be a plus to a guy, because it means she knows how to work hard, push herself to the limits to get things accomplished, has a very functional budget in place, and places a high value on herself and will therefore place a high value on him and his needs. Women don't need men to "take care of them" or to even "provide" for them (many women make more money than their husbands anyway), but they want one to love and to be their companion. That should be viewed as an honor, not an insult.

Self-care is all the rage right now, but somehow that only translates into women getting massages or taking long baths or getting mani-pedis or something. No one has thought about the fact that for some women providing themselves with a special expensive accessory is more of a reward and more of a stress reliever than any of the other things associated with self-care. And yet it is looked down upon. It just feeds back into the patriarchal that men are better with money (and pretty much everything else outside the house). Y'all, I'm here to tell you that for the most part, women are waaaaaaayyyy better with money and budgeting than men are. There are exceptions, but from what I've seen, men don't understand delayed gratification in purchasing the women do. The joke that you have to hold your wife's hand at the mall just so she won't shop is frankly disgusting and not in the least bit funny. Yes, they don't do window shopping like we do, but they buy something its huge; a boat, a car, a huge tv and sound system, etc. And they usually do it on a whim. When a woman makes a big purchase, she's probably been stewing over it and saving for it and listing all the pros and cons for several weeks, if not months. I think even tv has started to see this shift. You look at I Love Lucy: the men are always complaining that the women spend too much money. But they're given money in an allowance, as if they were children, and then left to their own devices and supposed to budget like an adult. But women were treated like children in general back then, so what did they expect? Then you look at The Cosby Show. Every time Clair know that Cliff is going to the hardware store, she has to call down there and tell them not to sell him anything. He's always buying stuff that he doesn't really need or will ever use. And yet Clair makes the biggest purchase of the family when she buys an $11,000 painting that she had spent months researching and tracking down.

So ladies, if you have your eye on that Gucci purse, or those Manolos, save up for them and wear them with pride! They are a testimony to how hard you work and how good you are at both your job and taking care of yourself. If that threatens a man, you don't need him anyway. So this is my bottom line: ladies, wear those labels as a badge of honor and achievement! And the rest of the world, especially men, need to stop judging women for how much money they've invested back into their own lives and well-being. We earned our first pair of Jimmy Choos fair and square and without male assistance, and that's how we plan on earning the next pair and the next. That bother you? Then move on; there's nothing for you to see here.

Monday, March 26, 2018

I have my new favorite dress for spring and summer and I wanted to share it with y'all! I originally found it at my favorite local consignment store, and then in searching for something else found it on the Nordstrom website. So that means I can link it for y'all. I actually liked it so much that I bought three other colors from the Nordstrom website. Don't worry, pictures of those will be forthcoming; after I get them hemmed. I'm such a short little person that I feel like I have to get everything hemmed. Even with my sky-high heels!

Monday, March 19, 2018

One of the trends that I was very skeptical about at the beginning of the season was the embroidered leather jacket. I really didn't understand why you would do that to a jacket. And then I started seeing them more and more in blogs and around town and in stores and it started to grow on me. I began to realize that the very attributes that at first made me hesitate to embrace the trend were the very things that were drawing me to it.

Embroidered leather jackets take something classic and take add a whole other level of interest to it. Also it juxtaposes something almost harsh and masculine with something soft and incredibly feminine. It ends up being the perfect combination and also a great object lesson in life.

So my friend and I both ended up buying an embroidered leather jacket. She got hers in black and I got mine in khaki. Our color choices fit our personalities perfectly. So we decided we would get together and do an impromptu photo shoot on the light side and dark side of embroidered leather jackets!

Friday, January 12, 2018

The holidays really got the best of me, so my apologies on being incredibly late on this post! One of my New Years resolutions is to do better staying on top of posting for y'all and do better at sharing my ideas sooner! I have some great ideas for upcoming posts that I'm really excited about. So stay tuned for those!

Thursday, January 4, 2018

So today I wanted to share with you some of my favorite eyeshadow palettes and a few of the looks that I have created with them. I'm obsessed with makeup; especially eyeshadow and lipstick. I sell an all natural makeup brand so I'm always posting different makeup looks in my Facebook makeup group (Audra Claire Beauty) and I thought it was time to share a few of them with you! Some of the pictures are slightly less flattering than others, but they show off the makeup, and that's what counts: right? I have a few other palettes that I love, but I think these have to be my favorite.

Urban Decay Naked Heat

I was incredibly skeptical when this palette came. I've never been able to wear red, pink or orange eyeshadows because they made me look like I had an allergy attack. But these colors were so pretty and so enticing it actually made me stop and think about it. Our Ulta store here brought in Urban Decay makeup artists and staged an event where the artists taught people how to use the Heat Palette. You can imagine that I was all over that. My friend and I went and had an amazing time and spent way too much money! So here are some of the looks I've done with the Heat Palette.

This was the look that the Urban Decay makeup artist created on me at the event

Younique Addiction Palette 1

This eyeshadow palette is from the all-natural makeup line that I sell. These eyeshadows have no chemicals, no animal products, and no allergens. It's awesome, it's beautiful, it's healthy and it's not ridiculously expensive! It's the perfect the neutral palette with a little bit of sparkly zing. It has everything from matte to shimmer, dark to highlight. It's my go-to for an every day look.

Morphe x Jaclyn Hill

I have been a huge fan of YouTuber Jaclyn Hill for as long as I can remember. I think I discovered her pretty soon after she started her channel. She does everything from incredibly helpful and everyday ideas to amazingly creative and inspirational ideas. She also seems to be a wonderfully sweet and amazing person as well. She was my inspiration for truly falling in love with makeup and trying new ideas for the sake of trying them, and not just trying things I expected to look good on me. I went crazy when she announced that she was partnering with Morphe to create her own palette. And then it took longer than expected for it to launch because she spent extra time on it to make sure it was perfect! I love the colors. They're so much fun and so useful. I have gone for a couple weeks and used this palette every day and done something different. It also makes a great base for using other eyeshadows. Her shimmer eyeshadows are amazing! I actually gave this palette to a couple of my girlfriends for Christmas. That's how much I love it.

Urban Decay Naked Smoky

I love my Urban Decay Palettes. I have like five of them and they're all amazing and all my favorites. This one is all you need to create the perfect the smoky eye. For some reason that eye look always seem to be a mystery to people who don't have a intimate relationship with their makeup, but this palette takes away the guesswork. And I love the dark purple that is randomly placed in the palette. It goes so well with so many looks! And even though I don't wear much purple, I love wearing purple eyeshadow. Sadly, Urban Decay is discontinuing this palette, so hurry now and get it 50% off at Sephora, Ulta and Nordstrom Rack.

Younique Addiction Palette 3

This is another of the palettes from the natural line I sell. This is the pink and purple palette in the set. I love this one, because I love wearing purple and these are pinks that I can actually wear without looking ill. And you can't beat the shimmer on these shadows. There are five palettes in this line that cover other family groups such as blue and taupe and bright colors.

Urban Decay Heavy Metal

So Urban Decay came out with this palette while no one was looking and then all of sudden it started popping on my Facebook feed continuously, so of course I had to check it out. I opened it and immediately fell in love. I'm a huge fan of shimmer shadows, so of course I'm automatically going to buy a palette that is all metallic. It has definitely lived up to my expectations. I'm so in love with this palette that it's all I can really say about it. Just go buy it. You'll thank me later.

Anastasia Beverly Hills Subculture

This is the last one. I promise! I just discovered this palette last week. A girl in my Facebook mom's group posted about how much she loved this palette and it was on sale that day. So I went to Sephora (for the second time that day - but who's counting . . . ) and grabbed it. I've only really used it once so far, but I love it! I found the perfect green combo that I've been after for so long. I can't wait for all the fun things I'm going to be able to do with this palette!